A flight management system (FMS) is a fundamental part of an aircraft which is used to control a navigation of the aircraft. The FMS may hold a flight plan of the aircraft, and allow the pilot to modify the flight plan as required during the flight. The FMS uses various sensors to determine a position of the aircraft. Given the position and the flight plan, the FMS is able to guide the aircraft along the flight plan or flight path. The FMS is normally controlled through a small screen and a keyboard. The FMS also may display the flight plan on an electronic flight instrument system (EFIS), navigation display (ND) or multi-function display (MFD). Further, the FMS may compute predicted speed, altitude, fuel consumed along the flight plan, and so on.
An equi-distance point (EDP) may be computed by the FMS to safely navigate the aircraft, where the EDP may provide a point from which the distance to fly to two given reference points (e.g., two airports) is equal. The EDP may act as an advisory for the pilot during emergency situations where an emergency landing may be required. Currently, publicly visible methods for computing such a point appear to use a very simplified formula based on many approximations. Thus, the currently available methods may not be capable of determining the EDP which considers an equal distance from the two given reference points to the flight plan or flight path of the aircraft.